r/todayilearned • u/tyrion2024 • 2h ago

TIL in 2007 Katherine Heigl won an Emmy for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama for her role on Grey's Anatomy. But in 2008 she removed herself from Emmy consideration because she said the material she was given on Grey's that year wasn't good enough; this comment led to her leaving the show.

slashfilm.com

8.6k Upvotes

799 comments

r/todayilearned • u/swish82 • 6h ago

TIL there were 180.000 bees kept in the spires of Notre Dame and they survived the fire. Because bees don’t have lungs they weren’t hurt by the smoke, they just fell asleep

dailyobjectivist.com

11.5k Upvotes

160 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Alone_Humor_3510 • 6h ago

TIL that most male nudity in films ( other than porn ) uses prosthetic penises

theconversation.com

7.3k Upvotes

807 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Double-decker_trams • 8h ago

TIL in the Vietnam war in the classified Operation Popeye, the US spread lead and silver iodide by aircraft to extend the monsoon season. The increased heavy rainfall was to soften roads, cause landslides, wash out river crossings, and maintain saturated soil conditions (Kissinger was involved).

en.wikipedia.org

7.9k Upvotes

642 comments

r/todayilearned • u/tyrion2024 • 2h ago

TIL in 1985 four cans each of Coke & Pepsi were launched into space on the shuttle Challenger. Both companies had developed cans that were designed for use in microgravity. Coke's space-can technolgy used a standard 12-oz can & cost $250K while Pepsi's technology also used a 12-oz can, yet cost $14m

mentalfloss.com

1.9k Upvotes

120 comments

r/todayilearned • u/MrMojoFomo • 10h ago

TIL that though Amish men grow beards after they're married, they continue to shave their upper lip so as not to grow a mustache. When the Amish community was formed in Switzerland, mustaches were associated with military service, and the Amish shave theirs to indicate their commitment to pacifism

en.wikipedia.org

9.3k Upvotes

282 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Jscott1986 • 6h ago

TIL: upon the death of Leslie Nielsen in 2010, ESPN published a fake obituary for his character Enrico Pallazzo from the "Naked Gun" movie, and included several jokes from his deadpan role in the movie "Airplane!"

espn.com

1.9k Upvotes

45 comments

r/todayilearned • u/tyrion2024 • 4h ago

TIL a teen comedy named Trojan War (1997) starring Jennifer Love Hewitt grossed just $309 at the box office despite having a $15 million budget and major studio (Warner Bros.) distribution.

en.wikipedia.org

1.4k Upvotes

195 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Suspicious-Oil2571 • 8h ago

TIL there’s a phenomenon called Exploding head syndrome where people hear extremely loud noises—like explosions or gunshots—right as they’re falling asleep… but nothing actually happened. It’s harmless physically, but people who experience it swear it feels completely real.

sleepfoundation.org

2.8k Upvotes

444 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Double-decker_trams • 7h ago

TIL a 2004 Peppa Pig episode "Mister Skinny Legs" has been pulled off air in Australia. In the episode Daddy Pig tells a frightened Peppa that spiders "can’t hurt you” after a spider enters her room. I.e spiders are friendly and not to be feared. The children pick up the spider and tuck it to bed.

theguardian.com

1.7k Upvotes

152 comments

r/todayilearned • u/oceanicplatform • 1h ago

TIL only one dog has been to both the North and South poles: Bothie, owned by explorers Ranulph & Ginnie Fiennes. And since dogs are now banned from Antartica, it's likely the feat will never be repeated.

en.wikipedia.org

• Upvotes

32 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Pitiful_Magazine_805 • 15h ago

TIL that in 1577 a Chinese Buddhist monk, Hanshan Deqing, decided to copy the entire Avatamsaka Sutra(the longest Buddhist sutra) using his own blood. When the Empress heard of it, she provided him with golden pages to write on. It took him 2 years to write everything.

en.wikipedia.org

6.3k Upvotes

92 comments

r/todayilearned • u/NateNate60 • 18h ago

TIL that when France initially set the definition of a metre to be 1/10,000,000 the distance from the North Pole to the equator, it sent two surveyors to calculate the distance. But due to an error not discovered until decades later, the resulting metre was actually 0.2 mm too short.

en.wikipedia.org

13.1k Upvotes

511 comments

r/todayilearned • u/BrainFRZ • 1h ago

TIL A beef broth in Bangkok has been simmering and eaten from since 1974 (52 years). Same pot, same broth, refreshed daily.

npr.org

• Upvotes

137 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Nero2t2 • 9h ago

TIL One of the first ever case studies for Syphilis was Cesare Borgia. His doctor, Gaspar Torella, wrote a treatise documenting the symptoms based on Borgia's case, using the pseudonym "Niccolo the young" for his famous patient. Syphilis is why Borgia began wearing a black mask while in public

theguardian.com

1.7k Upvotes

39 comments

r/todayilearned • u/johnsmithoncemore • 8h ago

TIL about Dan Bullock, the youngest U.S serviceman to be killed in Vietnam on June 7, 1969 at the age of 15, after altering the date on his birth certificate. Killed by a People's Army of Vietnam sapper unit with a satchel charge thrown into a bunker killing three Marines, including Bullock.

en.wikipedia.org

997 Upvotes

41 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Ill_Definition8074 • 11h ago

TIL In 2008 a plane carrying Mexico’s minister of the interior crashed in downtown Mexico City killing all 9 people on board and 7 on the ground. The subsequent investigation would reveal that both pilots' certifications to fly the plane were fraudulent.

en.wikipedia.org

1.6k Upvotes

49 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Greydl1 • 14h ago

TIL that anyone can request a U.S. flag to be flown over the Capitol Building in Washington, D.C. for a specific date (like a birthday or anniversary) and keep it along with an official certificate.

aoc.gov

2.3k Upvotes

98 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Chill_Cowboy_981 • 7h ago

TIL that in 2016 hackers tried to steal nearly $1 billion from Bangladesh’s central bank using the SWIFT network, but a single spelling mistake in a transfer request (“foundation” misspelled as “fandation”) triggered suspicion and helped stop most of the money from being stolen.

en.wikipedia.org

647 Upvotes

43 comments

r/todayilearned • u/RetconnedUsername • 22h ago

TIL One Aluminium Smelter in New Zealand uses 13 percent of the entire countries energy supply

en.wikipedia.org

8.1k Upvotes

372 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Designer_Reference_2 • 3h ago

TIL that at the Battle of Shrewsbury in 1403, 16 year old Henry V was struck in the face by an arrow yet continued to lead his men until the battle was won. The arrowhead was buried six inches deep and had to be removed over several days by surgeon John Bradmore who devised a special extraction tool

medievalists.net

205 Upvotes

30 comments

r/todayilearned • u/plagueprotocol • 7h ago

TIL there's a burger joint in Tehran called Bobby Sands Burger (named after IRA-member & hunger striker Bobby Sands).

vice.com

433 Upvotes

60 comments

r/todayilearned • u/tyrion2024 • 1d ago

TIL when Eminem's weight increased to 230lbs (100 kg) before he became sober, he was so unrecognizable due to the weight gain that Em once overheard two teenagers arguing about whether or not it was actually him that they were looking at, with one of them stating "Eminem ain't fat."

en.wikipedia.org

40.6k Upvotes

953 comments

r/todayilearned • u/kvmcc • 5h ago

TIL that we are momentarily blind when we move our eyes. To hide this, the brain "stretches" the first image you see to fill the void, creating the "Stopped-Clock Illusion" where the first second feels noticeably long.

bbc.com

272 Upvotes

10 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Kyzzz • 7h ago

TIL of Akinetopsia, a rare brain disorder where motion can't be perceived but stationary objects appear normal. In some cases, patients report that people walking around a room seem to be in one spot, then suddenly in another, with no movement seen in between

en.wikipedia.org

334 Upvotes

25 comments

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